March 24, 2008

... wait until you get a load of the next Chicago "Reverend," one James Meeks, another South Side horror show with a special sideline in the baiting of homosexuals. He, too, has been an Obama supporter, and his church has been an occasional recipient of Obama's patronage. And perhaps he, too, can hope to be called "controversial" for his use of the term house nigger to describe those he doesn't like and for his view that it was "the Hollywood Jews" who brought us Brokeback Mountain.

Yes, and you did a great job on it from what I hear, BTW. I meant to type that but I'm watching TV (Bush's War) and got distracted. (I had posted that somewhere else, but not with the prominence it deserved).

Meeks is a Reverend and a State Representative. He is well known in Chicago. He is just trying to vie with the irrelevant empty resume named Jesse Jackson, another liar and racist of major proportions.

I liked this part of McCain's church's statement:About CreationWe believe that God created man in the image of God. Because of this, each and every human being possesses great dignity and is worthy of our respect and love. God confirms his love for each and every person when He sent His own son to die on the cross so that we might be able to be in relationship with Him through salvation in Jesus.

In Genesis, God created man to rule over the earth; therefore we are stewards of the earth and the resources it contains. We believe that we will be held accountable for that stewardship, along with the stewardship of our gifts, talents, and the provision God makes in our lives on a regular basis.

Rather than dwelling on evolution or other distraction they really seem to hone in on the real point. Very nice all around. Must be American Baptists.

Can we look at John Hagee's statements and the rest of the right wing clergy that John McCain has been heavily courting?

Well what little I know of Hagee, he seems to have a particular hard on for Catholics but then a lot of Protestants do so nothing new there. I'm Catholic myself so when I hear that the Catholic Church was the Roman Empire baptized I find it kinda funny.

Then again railing against someone's religion is not quite the same thing as spouting off racist and homophobic rants but I suppose others will disagree.

I think this is just one more reason to completely take religion [or anything related to it] out of the political arena. It may not be realistic in a US political race, which is too bad. I don't vote for a politician due to the church he / she does or does not attend or for the sermons that his pastors, ministers etc give.I think I'm in the minority on this....

Is this an appropriate time to quote the Reverend Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright's use of the popular expression "...chickens coming home to roost (you missed my turning around on my feet and swinging my arm around the home office, by the way)...."?

PS: Dopey Dems are deluding themselves if they don't think this sh*t from racialist pastors is turnout gold for McCain in battleground states, should Oh-Bah-Muh survive Hillary!'s efforts to steal the Democrat nomination.

Really, it's the gift that keeps on giving, with all due apologies to HSV-2...

How come no one ever reports on where Hillary goes to church? WHo her pastor is? What church(s) she has attended over the past twenty years?

Does she even go to church? Is she an atheist or an agnostic? Is she a satanist?

This is just another example of the media giving Hillary a free ride and a pass. Her experience was never examined, her vetting was never examined, and now that religion is all the rage this week, she again gets a free ride.

This connection is a lot less direct and a lot shallower than Obama's connection to Wright. It parallels McCain's ties to Hagee and other right-wing preachers -- it is annoying that they suck up to those sorts of people, but that's politics for you.

Obama's association with his church and its pastor are much more troubling because of their depth and longevity.

I think if Obama had been "heavily courting" Wright in order to get some votes, we'd be able to look past it.

But as we all know, Obama went to the church for 20 years, had his kids baptised by Wright, titled his book with one of Wright's phrases, gave $20K to the church, etc.

He didn't denounce Wright during his speech but only disagreed with some things the Rev said. Which ones, Barack didn't specify. Maybe he disagreed when Wright picked the Bears to win the Super Bowl last year, who knows?

Given all that, it is not unreasonable to wonder whether Obama shares Wright's Black Nationalist philosophy to some degree. Some of the liberals on this board don't have a problem with that, but the general electorate will.

"Obama's association with his church and its pastor are much more troubling because of their depth and longevity.

Yes, that is, of course, true. The thing about Wright is that it provokes searches that turn up the like of Meeks; when the likes of him are found, the ensuing news reminds swing voters in battleground states all over again about Wright, which does not redound to Obama's benefit.

I'm thinking Obama's speech, notwithstanding the hostess's characterization of it standing the 300-year test for excellent speeches, was very much like Johnny Cochran's closing argument in the O.J. trial - if you though O.J. innocent (or were otherwise in the tank for him), you thought it masterful telling of the truth; if you thought O.J. guilty, you thought it disingenuous and potentially effective in duping the gullible.

I'm not thinking swing voters in battleground states are willing to suspend disbelief long enough to buy the speech.

It does not say where she goes to church now or if she goes to church. It just talks about the past and her religious beliefs.

I do not care what she beleives in, but if we, and I mean all of us, can trash Wright, Meeks, Romney, Huckabee, Hagee, Falwell, or anyone else, it is only fair to know if she has a minister and what he preaches. Or is it some kind of top secret that she will not allow to be released? A little fairness would be nice.

Yeah, I know asking for fairness from a Clinton is a losing proposition.

Like I've said before, even if you assume that Hagee's as bad as Wright and his ties to McCain are as strong as Wright's ties to Obama... well, that means that non-white Catholics get pushed to Obama and white non-Catholics get pushed to McCain. Guess which of those two groups is much, much larger than the other?

Responding to "Obama's friends hate white people" by saying "Oh yeah? Well McCain's friends hate CATHOLICS" is, from a political perspective, monumentally stupid. Even if you think anti-Catholic bigotry is as bad as racial bigotry (a ridiculous assertion), the fact is that there are a hell of a lot more whites than Catholics in the United States.

Here are more details from the interview transcript. Looks like she doesn't have a home church in New York:

Q: Since you joined the Senate and moved to New York finding a spiritual home in New York, a regular church has been something that has been difficult. Has that impacted your faith in any way?

Senator Clinton: No, no. Because of my job now, I go in and out of so many churches and I have so many opportunities to be part of other people’s faith experiences and I really have cherished that. I’ve developed some very close relationships and friendships with people, particularly in New York, and now that I’m running for president I try to, where I can, go to church somewhere else. I was stunned when I went to church in Davenport some months ago, and it was such a really lively multimedia, music-driven service, which you don’t often find in a Methodist church. I’m interested in the liturgy, I’m interested in the message, I’ve always been just fascinated by how people convey their faith and how they try to live their faith. I actually feel like it’s a blessing that I get to be exposed to all of this.

Q: But, your whole life you’ve had a regular church home, so it must be unusual that you don’t have a regular one now.

Senator Clinton: I don’t feel that way. I kept my membership at First Methodist in Little Rock when we moved to Washington, and I still have kept it there. I was back there last summer and it felt like going home. That was a very important church to me when I was in Little Rock.

All I got from the article is that Meeks hates gays. Again, so what? Many Christians, Jews, and Moslems consider Homosexuality an abomination. If that is their religious belief, they are entitled to it. This is America, after all.

People are allowed to believe what they want. What counts is what they do. I live in Chicago. Meeks flock does not actively seek out gays to persecute. They do not walk the streets of Boys Town preaching hatred.

If they want to believe gays are evil, so be it. Who are any of us to demonize another's belief.

But there is nothing (that I'm aware of) in his public policy record that indicates that. Correct?

There's nothing in his public policy record that contradicts it, either. That's why we have to wonder. Politically speaking the guy is very much a blank slate, especially since he has never had the seniority to do much of anything other than follow the herd.

So we have to ask ourselves -- why'd he attend such a racist church for so long if he didn't believe what it taught? Was he just sucking up to the local black community (at his children's expense, no less), or did he actually believe that crap? The thing is, if he didn't really believe in it then the obvious and politically expedient move would have been to ditch that church at least a year ago and distance himself from Wright. He didn't do that. He didn't even do it when Wright's hate-filled sermons were playing on the nightly news.

Maybe your reading of all this is different, but it seems to me that under Occam's Razor the simplest theory that sufficiently explains Obama's multi-decade membership in the church and his close friendship and association with its pastor is that he actually believes what the church teaches.

Forget Obama. Imagine a generic white politician, Joe Smith. Joe has for the last twenty years attended a church whose beliefs are explicitly that God exists to favor the white race over others. Smith's pastor and close personal friend routinely makes remarks denigrating non-whites, as well as white people whose first loyalty isn't to their race.

But, on the other hand, Smith has given some *very* pretty speeches about how important he thinks it is to take a new approach to racial issues and move beyond the racial strife of the past centuries. He hasn't actually done anything about it, mind you, but he sure does talk pretty.

Now I ask you. Which of these is more likely:

(A): Smith is a racist and is, like any politician who wants to get elected outside of Baton Rouge, misrepresenting himself as having nice modern-day middle-American views about race.

or

(B): Smith has spent the vast majority of his adult life attending a church whose beliefs are diametrically opposed to his own, befriended an overt racist despite being appalled by racism, has (perhaps worst of all) subjected his children to all those same things, and has refused to part ways with the church even in the face of total campaign catastrophe... all for some unknown reason.

Honestly, now -- can you pick "B" with a straight face? Come on. If the races and parties were reversed in this situation Republicans would even now be drinking themselves into a stupor while wondering if there was some way to draft Fred Thompson during the convention. McCain's campaign would be dead, dead, DEAD, because *no* sane person would think a white man attends a white-supremacist church for decades without being a racist, no matter how much he talks about racial equality.

I will give you credit for trying to keep your vow of cruel neutrality. However, I don't think that you're really being cruel enough to Obama for your treatment to be considered really neutral.

You've posted about some of Obama's problems, but I don't remember seeing anything on your blog about the Rezko scandal, or about his Weather Underground supporters, or about his repeated gaffes re. military issues, or about his campaign telling Canada that his NAFTA-bashing was just rhetoric for the Ohio hillbillies.

And when you've posted about his Wright problem, you haven't pointed out how he lied (first stating that he had no idea that Wright had ever said these things, then stating that he knew about them but that he considered Wright to be an eccentric uncle).

And you're giving him a pass on all of this: He brought his children to this church to listen to anti-white racist screeds Sunday after Sunday, and yet you thought his speech justifying it, and scolding us "typical white people" for needing more racial re-education, was brilliant.

So I won't give you credit for actually keeping your vow -- only for trying.

Actually, I disagree -- I suspect that Obama actually believes very little of what Wright screeches, regarding race or even faith.

Obama's not an idiot, after all, and you'd have to be an idiot to believe much of this crap. So I'll give him the benefit of the doubt here.

No, I think that he felt that he needed to attend the "blackest" church that he could find, to compensate for his only half-black heritage, and get the necessary street-cred to get elected by a primarily black constituency.

Which makes him the most loathesome sort of hypocrite, and a child-abuser. But at least he's not a racist!

Obama's choice of Wright as his personal holy man says a lot more about his core beliefs than some votes on ethanol or bridge construction.

But again, none of those beliefs have manifested themselves elsewhere. E.g., public policy.

A black nationalist who embraces all of Wright's views (or the main parts of them) simply cannot make the speech that Obama did.

Now, if you believe that speech was a ruse, a cover for his radical agenda then there's nothing I can do to dissuade you.

No, I believe (call me a sucker) that Obama is sincere in trying to move racial matters forward into a post-Civil Rights Era world. Less finger pointing outwardly and more finger pointing inwardly.

But I also believe that his approach to move the issue forward is to simply have more government programs and more social spending. A top down, Washington controlled policy. Because he believes that economics are driving whatever racial divisions remain.

Good Lord--Some of you lefty doofuss's thatmay think Hagee is an issue; but trust me baby--the redneck crackers in PA are going to look at Obama and his mentor and cast both of those folks out with the devils. Of course, given Hillary's gallantry under fire in Bosnia, it will be difficult to tell which liar emerges unscathed--but I'm betting Obama and his church problem will have stronger legs than Hillary with her lying problem. Come on April 22

Poor ole John McCain: all he has is that footage of his repatriation.

This is not going to be pretty pretty for whichever lying bastard wins the democratic nomination. But we will know, that both of them are self serving, scuzzy liars. As always: YMMV

The brainwashed lefties will all trot out their moral equivalence arguments, or outright admit their affiliation with Wright's beliefs. The liberal press and punditry will all pretend it is a minor kerfluffle, that Obama's speech was magnificent and put his relationship with his pastor in proper context, blah blah. But for the rest of America Obama's intimate relationship with this vile, racist, Marxist, America hater renders him permanently unelectable to the office of POTUS. Period.

I believe (call me a sucker) that Obama is sincere in trying to move racial matters forward into a post-Civil Rights Era world.

"Senator: If Wright is a man of the past, why would you expose your children to his vitriolic divisiveness? It is not just the older congregants who stand and cheer and roar in wild approval of Wright's rants, but young people as well.

...Why did you give $22,500 just two years ago to a church run by a man of the past who infects the younger generation with precisely the racial attitudes and animus you say you have come unto us to transcend?"

On the larger question of race: I have my own views. If there is any plus side at all to this already poisoned campaign it should bring our racial issues to the fore for resolution. I don't see that, however--the racial issues have been dragged thru the mud and conflated with some very interesting views of the role of christianity in Western Culture. I dont see any resolution to this problem. The American media isnt smart enough collectively to pour piss out of a boot. And we lack in this nation the person who could even frame this debate. It will be left to the worse angels of our nature to resolve these things, until a better class of both politicians and pundits materialize.

"A black nationalist who embraces all of Wright's views (or the main parts of them) simply cannot make the speech that Obama did."

I didn't say Obama embraced *all* of Wright's views, only that he bought into Wright's philosophy to some degree.

It would be easier to guage the degree to which Obama subscribes to said philosophy if he would go down the list of controversial statements one by one and either refute or endorse, but that is not going to happen.

Normally we don't give politicians the benefit of the doubt in these matters. He wants to be President so he should explain where his beliefs come from and how they will affect public policy.

He wants to say "Hey, I don't agree with everything my crazy old opressed uncles said" and leave it at that.

My hog has not seen any action for an entire week fellow republicans. That is the longest in a long time that I haven't gotten any.

I am preparing for my cross country road trip and then into Mexico. I am excited, nervous, and a little horny thinking of my possible experiences.

The rare clumbers will be coming, natch. I will be gone for almost 1 month.

On the Christopher Hitchens article most gays are well aware of blacks and black ministers hatred of gays. This is nothing new. Many from the evalengelical right enrolled black ministers in the entire gay marriage amendment ridiculousness.

You can find all about it in a widely under-read article in the September 2007 issue of Mother Jones, in which Kathryn Joyce and Jeff Sharlet reported that "through all of her years in Washington, Clinton has been an active participant in conservative Bible study and prayer circles that are part of a secretive Capitol Hill group known as "The "Fellowship," also known as The Family. But it won't be a secret much longer. Jeff Sharlet's shocking exposé The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power will be published in May.

In the 1940s, The Family reached out to former and not-so-former Nazis, and its fascination with that exemplary leader, Adolf Hitler, has continued, along with ties to a whole bestiary of murderous thugs. As Sharlet reported in Harper's in 2003:

During the 1960s the Family forged relationships between the U.S. government and some of the most anti-Communist (and dictatorial) elements within Africa's postcolonial leadership. The Brazilian dictator General Costa e Silva, with Family support, was overseeing regular fellowship groups for Latin American leaders, while, in Indonesia, General Suharto (whose tally of several hundred thousand "Communists" killed marks him as one of the century's most murderous dictators) was presiding over a group of fifty Indonesian legislators. During the Reagan Administration the Family helped build friendships between the U.S. government and men such as Salvadoran general Carlos Eugenios Vides Casanova, convicted by a Florida jury of the torture of thousands, and Honduran general Gustavo Alvarez Martinez, himself an evangelical minister, who was linked to both the CIA and death squads before his own demise.

At the heart of The Family's American branch is a collection of powerful right-wing politicos, who include, or have included, Sam Brownback, Ed Meese, John Ashcroft, James Inhofe and Rick Santorum. They get to use The Family's spacious estate on the Potomac, The Cedars, which is maintained by young men in Family group homes and where meals are served by The Family's young women's group. And, at The Family's frequent prayer gatherings, they get powerful jolts of spiritual refreshment, tailored to the already powerful.

Clinton fell in with The Family in 1993

Pastor James Meeks's faith has led him down some Hillarian paths as well. From his official bio, he campaigned to close down liquor stores, opened a Christian school, trained parishioners to start their own investment club, and set up a program for pregnant youth and teenaged mothers called "It Takes a Village.

"In 1998, Rev. Senator Meeks led the rally to "dry up" Roseland Community by collecting votes to close 26 area liquor stores. He also established Salem Christian Academy School (SCA), to focus on providing quality education to over 500 children from preschool thru 8thgrade. Rev. Senator Meeks started "It Takes a Village", a mentoring program to provide guidance and support to pregnant youth and young teen mother.

Rev. Senator Meeks has many successful community initiatives that include educational scholarships for children, feeding the homeless and drug rehab programs. His recent project was an 8-week financial training seminar for the congregation and the community, resulting in the formation of profitable investment clubs."

After reading Meeks' bio in the Chicago Reader just now, I'm fairly certain I knew his daddy. Jimmy Meeks, who among other things helped find jobs for ex-gang members, was an active member of Jesse Jackson's Operation PUSH.

Titus: I weep for your shaved, waxed yet underutilized hog. As I understand the great sideral by which all time is determined, trust me, titus, your hog will see some action

As to the rare Clumbers--as an owner of both great danes and english mastiffs, I have serious concerns about your ability to succor your charges. we can speak to this later; however, I would remind you that your charges (the rare clumbers) are field dogs, which, in turn, requires YOU (yes, YOU, Titus) to acquire an appropriat firearm, take to the field, and fulfill the rare clumbers genetic destiny.

(I am available for consultation as to weapons, fields and other hunting issues about which you may require guidance--for a small fee of course) What more could I do for one of our fellow republicans

Obama's not an idiot, after all, and you'd have to be an idiot to believe much of this crap.

Well, no. The belief that the US government created AIDS to kill black people is bizarre and runs counter to our scientific understanding of the world -- but, um, so does a lot of Christian theology. If an intelligent person can believe that someone came back from the dead after three days as a corpse then I don't see why he can't believe that the US government caused AIDS. At least we know that the US government exists.

BTW Titus: should you get to Memphis, TN, in your travels, it would be my great privilege to be your host. I think my profile has name which, in turn, could lead you to contact information. I look forward to making your acquaintance--perhaps at the Peabody in Memphis. Godspeed.

A black nationalist who embraces all of Wright's views (or the main parts of them) simply cannot make the speech that Obama did. Now, if you believe that speech was a ruse, a cover for his radical agenda then there's nothing I can do to dissuade you.

Just so we're clear on this: your argument is that it is completely reasonable to think that a proponent of racial equality would attend a racist church for twenty years and include its racist pastor as a personal and political adviser... but entirely unreasonable to think that a black nationalist could make a pretty speech about racial equality?

Seriously, now, what color is the sky on your world? Politicians have been making bullshit speeches that bear no resemblance to their actual beliefs for thousands of years. Sweet Jesus on a Pogo stick, how many gay-bashing Republicans have been outed as gay in the last five years *alone*? How many come into office on an anti-corruption platform and then turn out to have been taking bribes for years? How many preach temperance and morality and then get caught snorting cocaine or banging hookers?

But oh no, of course they can't lie about race. Why, that's just completely beyond the realm of possibility.

My favorite Obama ruse is the belief that Government can solve lots of problems for us. I think he beguiles his audience into believing that he, Obama, will be the government employee dedicated to solving their problems. When they come into the government jobs office, it will be Obama behind the desk ready to listen and dole out government jobs paying $100k. When they come into free health care clinic, Harvard educated Dr. Obama will be there to cure all their ills for free. When they send their kids to public school, the highly educated Obama will be there to teach and discipline their kids.

How disappointing when they find its a government worker making $20k a year who doesn't give a rats ass about anyone but themselves.

Interesting, I was not aware of that. I wonder of Obama supports the idea of Israel defending itself? Someone should ask him. I am sure he would say something like "a measured response is appropriate."

"Hitchens: "The consequence, which you can already feel, is an inchoate resentment among many white voters who are damned if they will be called bigots by a man who associates with Jeremiah Wright."

Is he right?"

Uh, yeah, I'm thinking Hitchens pretty much nailed that one on the head. The only white voters who will vote for Obama after being called bigots by the Reverend Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright will be those white voters Shelby Steele writes about so perfectly.

Thomas Jefferson wrote passionately about the evils of slavery while owning slaves. There's no simple answer to why. Clearly he was capable of believing strongly in something on the one hand, and going against those beliefs to preserve his lifestyle.

I have to believe that Wright gave Obama insight into a set of beliefs that would have been basically unknown to him, but would have explained a lot of what he saw and heard day-to-day in Chicago. That would be pretty huge. I can see why he'd want his children to be exposed to it.

I'm not saying it makes sense, is true, or is even acceptable in any way. I am saying your explanations are too facile and too logical for something that probably isn't.

But reader_iam -- no lesser a being than Billy Kristol doesn't want to near nothin no more about race. Give it a rest, sez he:

The only part of the [Obama] speech that made me shudder was this sentence: “But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now.”

As soon as I heard that, I knew what we’d have to endure. I knew that there would be a stampede of editorial boards, columnists and academics rushing not to ignore race. A national conversation about race! At long last!

Of course, memories are short. In 1997 President Bill Clinton announced, with great fanfare, that he intended “to lead the American people in a great and unprecedented [if he did say so himself] conversation about race.” That conversation quickly went nowhere. And just as well.

The last thing we need now is a heated national conversation about race.

I'm not sure that the unusually clean, articulate, and bright black man Obama is necessarily a hardcore racist (although his "typical white person" quote certainly gives one pause). I doubt that he really believes much of what Wright spews from his pulpit -- I think that he belonged to this church out of political expediency.

People who need or think they need the most racist blacks in order to have the most "credibility" so as not to be out "Uncle-Tom'd" in S Chicago races with more whitey-hating black "street smart" pols - while not believing the bigoted garbage themselves? Just exploiting the connection.

Eerily similar to George Wallace and Strom Thurmond having very moderate views then losing major elections by being "out-nigger'd" by whites and white Reverends with real white supremacist views and real credibility in the white version of S Chicago - the Jim Crow South.After losing elections as moderates, Strom and George retained cordial, respectful relations with blacks, and when running for national office minimized their race-baiting and association with firebrand racists. But in between? In local politics? Both resorted to expediency. Spoke in the code their Southern white followers wanted and maintained close ties to the white versions of Rev Meeks, Rev Sharpton, Rev Jesse, Mayor "Dickhead" Washington, Louis Farrakan, Rev. Wright.

Funny how Obama, Strom Thurmond, and George Wallace started. They were moderates, all had good biracial relations. All lost their first contest by either not being black (supremacist) enough or white (supremacist) enough. All smart men, they then forged the association ties they needed with bigoted firebreathers to assure themselves long political careers that would never be "out-niggered" or "out-Uncle Tom'd" again.

In their later years, when the racial advantage of being hard on civil rights waned, both Wallace and Thurmond deliberately had a rapproachement with blacks and returned to being the moderate men they "naturally were" but had to foreswear to be electable...Obama may be ultra-liberal and may not feel a burning love of America. But I doubt he hates whites or has had a life of simmering resentments for all the whitey guilt and keeping black folk down as oppressor race - or that rose, the more privileged and elite he got. Which may not be true of Michelle Obama. Obama likely believes 5% of the crap Wright says. His wife who brought him into the church? Perhaps more...

But there is nothing (that I'm aware of) in his public policy record that indicates that.

Correct?

Incorrect, we have at least two examples in Obama’s public policy record*. First there was his vote against the confirmation of John Roberts to Supreme Court because he thought Roberts didn’t know what it was like to be a black single mom and the other is his speech opposing the Iraq war in which he told his audience that it was a plot by Karl Rove to distract the public from corporate scandals, poverty, and the uninsured.

As far as whether Obama is “too smart” to believe the garbage he was listening to every Sunday with his wife and children, who cares? For all we know Jeremiah Wright doesn’t believe the filth he spews and just does it for the same reason George Wallace used to use the N-word in his speeches – he was able to work up his audience and use their anger for his ambitions. In Wallace’s case, it helped him get elected governor. In Wright’s case, it’s let him fleece his flock. In Obama’s case, it gave him a base to launch his political career.

* Possibly more if you look at his curriculum when he was a “Senior Lecturer” at the U of Chicago Law School and basically got stuck teaching the Modern Racial Issues in the Law seminar.

Illinois State Senator Barack Obama, Oct. 2, 2002, ina speech he was advised would alienate potentialdownstate voters months before he became a candidatefor the U.S. Senate:

"...I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history. I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of Al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars."

I'm not sure I get this "cruel neutrality" thing you've taken on. If you think being totally objective equally toward each candidate could might possibly perhaps, maybe lead to an informed choice in the voting booth, then seems to me the obvious extension of that stance would be the realization that none of these candidates comes close to truly representing you, and the cruelest most neutral stance available is not to vote for anybody. There is no best candidate, nor worst, nor best of the worst, or worst of the worst, cruelly neutrally speaking. Cruel neutrality is Photoshopping kittens and blithely having a wee on both their rotted parties while these bastards bloody themselves duking it out. At this point I honestly don't care who flies around in AF1, crash it for all I care, either maniac will do perfectly well. The whole world knows by now it takes a world class maniac to get there.

Thomas Jefferson wrote passionately about the evils of slavery while owning slaves. There's no simple answer to why. Clearly he was capable of believing strongly in something on the one hand, and going against those beliefs to preserve his lifestyle.

That oversimplifies Jefferson's reasons for not freeing his slaves. As I've noted elsewhere, he wasn't legally able to do so even if he wanted to.

But I'm afraid I don't see your point. Let's take the worst-case scenario: that Jefferson talked a good game on slavery but when push came to shove preferred to keep slavery in place. Well, would you honestly expect a black man to vote for someone like that? A person who says pretty words about freedom but is, objectively speaking, a disgusting racist?

Of course you wouldn't. Nor should you expect me, or any white person, to vote for an anti-white racist just because he speaks pretty words about racial equality.

I am saying your explanations are too facile and too logical for something that probably isn't.

Maybe. But answer me this: why would I want a black President who thinks irrationally about white people? The country is 70% white. That would be like electing Cedarford Prime Minister of Israel or something.

We didn't make all of the civil rights progress that we did with a big national dialog. We changed laws and we changed the cultural stigma attached to bigotted language. We didn't "ideate" (to quote a commercial"), we just "did".

Not that "Mission [is] Accomplished", but we have made enough progress in this regard that it is time to do the same thing to the other side of the coin-- namely, applying the same stigma to the toxic views held by Wright and entirely too many in the black community.

We do not need a national dialog. We need to simply start treating unacceptable and destructive views exactly as they are-- unacceptable and destructive. Obama doesn't need to reject Wright; we need to, by rejecting those who act as if his outlook on life is normal, understandable, or even acceptable.

Thomas Jefferson wrote passionately about the evils of slavery while owning slaves. There's no simple answer to why.

I don't blame the US for the sin of slavery. The Bill of Rights was radical for its time - liberating the merchant class from the nobility. Shay's rebellion even took it a step further, but not enough - no rights for women, no rights for slaves, no rights for animals. Anyone trying to promote those values would have been laughed out of the room and their new Constitution discarded.

Culture's EVOLVE. We ended slavery. We gave equal rights to women, we passed laws to protect animals from cruelty, etc. Attempting all these things at once would have led to failure.

And we're still evolving. Slavery was justified the same way abortion is today - africans are subhuman & fetuses are nonhuman.

Thats why the "Damn America" speech is so misguided. The founders were not perfect by today's values, but they set us on the path that led to the realization and codification of today's values.

I do know that Jefferson passionately , maybe even obsessively, loved Monticello, and that he had persistent money problems, and that he couldn't have kept the place going without slaves. Didn't his family start selling off his possessions etc. not long after his death? And wasn't the house itself sold, or lost, or whatever, within relatively few years?

I'm not saying any of this would excuse whatever; I'm just sort of throwing it out there. Also, I could be wrong, in whole or in part.

Did you actually read Hitchens' piece? He blasted the lunatic right and McCain for accepting their endorsement. (One of the few things I liked about McCain was his contempt for the lunatic right. The only thing left is that he's still to the right of the two Democratic front runners. Oh and the odds of him kicking the bucket are high, so if he picks a really good VP, that will be good.)

One thing that puzzles me about Hillary's comment about religion in general is what's the point?

Granted, I was raised Mormon and am now agnostic, but I've never understood the point of going to just any Christian church. Isn't one point of religion to actually have a theology that you believe in? To pretend that the theology of Methodism, Lutheranism, etc. is interchangeable seems just bizarre to me. (Perhaps they are, after all I was raised in that kookie Mormon religion that thinks all the rest of you are going to hell, or rather not to the top kingdom of heaven unless you repent and are baptized vicariously.... oh never mind.)

“Once in the South of the Union I chanced to meet an old man who had lived in illicit intercourse with one of his Negro women. He had several children by her, who became their father's slaves as soon as they entered the world. He had several times thought of giving them at least their liberty, but years flowed by and he was still unable to remove the obstacles to emancipation put there by the legislators. Meanwhile he had grown old and was on the point of death. He imagined his sons dragged from market to market, exchanging a stranger's rod for a father's authority. Such horrible visions threw the dying man's imagination into delirium. I saw him a prey to the agony of despair, and then I understood how nature can revenge the wounds made by the laws.”